Re: "More US meddling", (PostBag, March 26).
I presume Clara Holzer is referring to Sirikan Charoensri, one of the founders of Thai Lawyers For Human Rights (TLHR), who received an International Woman Of Courage award from First Lady Melania Trump at the White House last week.
I do not understand why the work of TLHR should be regarded as seeking to import America's style of government to Thailand. This organisation was in fact formed after the 2014 military coup to defend the rights of those who are persecuted just for expressing an opinion.
Clara Holzer regularly expresses her opinions, but seems to think that it's just fine to suppress the right of others to do the same, just because she doesn't like what they say. To me, such an attitude smacks of moral and intellectual bankruptcy.
I'm not sure what Ms Holzer thinks about the other American influences which are now so widespread in Thailand. When I first visited here in the late 1960s I do not recall seeing a burger joint, KFC or any other fast food outlet, now they are everywhere, likewise American clothing brands, movies, you name it.
Many youngsters from better-off families are sent to school or university in America, where they may well absorb aspects of American culture.
If it's okay for food, fashion and education to be "globalised", then why not ideas and political opinions?
Robin Grant
All aboard litter train
Re: "All aboard 'The Pattaya Thunderbolt'", (Opinion, March 25).
Roger Crutchley's column reminded me of my very first trip on board a Thai train. It was back in 1989 when I took the Bangkok to Butterworth, Malaysia train which left Bangkok in the middle of the afternoon and arrived the following day.
That evening I headed down to the dining car, a non a/c carriage but cooled by fans and open windows. I found an empty table and ordered a meal and a beer, then lit a cigarette and waited for the meal to arrive. After a few minutes a staff member came in and started clearing one of the tables. Having scooped up the mess of leftover food, beer bottles, beer cans, soft-drink cans, newspapers, ashtray waste and crisp wrappers from the table, he then walked over to an open window and threw it all out!
Same again for the next table and the other tables -- all the waste went straight out the window! Still, I suppose throwing the leftover food out of the window must have been handy for all the local stray dogs, rats and other vermin that lived alongside the train tracks, though I don't think the people that lived nearby would have been pleased with the other items.
Peter Atkinson
Trump a real headache
President Donald Trump seems to have chosen a strategy that is at odds with his own advisers as regards the US-Russia relations.
While on the phone with Russian President Vladimir Putin last week, Mr Trump went out of his way to congratulate Mr Putin for his re-election success -- despite White House aides having written on his briefing materials as a warning to him: "DO NOT CONGRATULATE".
Even Republican lawmakers who resisted criticising him in the past, faulted Mr Trump for congratulating the Russian leader at this critical time.
President Trump's second mistake seems to be that he failed to raise the nerve-agent attack that happened in Britain -- as his advisers had emphatically suggested.
Now, this week, the Trump administration has expelled 60 Russian diplomats as well as ordered Russia's consulate in Seattle to close. The reasons being that all the 60 Russians were spies in the guise of diplomats; and the consulate in Seattle posed a risk to US security because of its proximity to a US Navy base.
Hence, it seems President Trump has -- intentionally or otherwise -- posed as a headache to his own administration, not the other way around.
Chavalit Wannawijitr
Chiang Mai
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